We are planning to make the trip to Hopkinsville, if I can travel that far. I'm counting on it. Rooms are already impossible close by. Thanks for all the info, S.F.

 

You're very welcome, dear lady. I hope some of my ramblings help everyone to better enjoy the eclipse experience in August.

Just to whet your appetite a bit.... Scientists have recently announced that they have detected a strange radio signal coming from a red dwarf star system named Ross 128, just 11 LY from Earth.

 

Stay tuned ...

Just to whet your appetite a bit.... Scientists have recently announced that they have detected a strange radio signal coming from a red dwarf star system named Ross 128, just 11 LY from Earth.

 

Stay tuned ...

 

Papaw is a big star gazer.

Papaw is a big star gazer.

 

He captured the brightest star of all when he found mamaw.

I love this image of Jupiter's South Pole, taken last December. Juno was about 32,000 miles above the Jovian giant's cloudtops when this image was captured. What a gorgeous plant!!!! It's beauty belies a planet besieged by unrivaled turbulence and chaos below those cloudtops.

 

He captured the brightest star of all when he found mamaw.

 

We closing in on 50 years of marriage. Also four year high school sweethearts. Wouldn't change a thing, yeah I'm a romantic.

We closing in on 50 years of marriage. Also four year high school sweethearts. Wouldn't change a thing, yeah I'm a romantic.

 

I am as well. I think you will agree with me that there is a certain romanticism connected to the cosmos. The dazzling beauty of the heavens, the mystery, the sounds of the universe, how it completely overwhelms the senses.... all of these things have romanced me from the time I was a child.

I've always been a big fan of space exploration, child of the 50's and 60's. Watched every liftoff that was on TV, would have hitchhiked with my son to see the nighttime liftoff of Columbia except I had work the next day. Plus he and a cousin drove down watched the launch, ate, made a pit stop and drove straight home. He took great pictures the old time way.My Dad had a first heart attack(coronary thrombosis) in March 1960. He became ill one evening and we had to take him to St E in Covington in November 1966, my junior year of HS, about 10 days or a week before Thanksgiving. I know the date because I wanted him home for the holiday. He had improved during the night and the cardiologist told my Mother that she should go home to rest. It had been a cloudy night driving to the hospital. We left in the early am hours to come home and the sky was only partly cloudy. As we drove south on U.S. 27, the clear spaces in the sky was filled with shooting stars. Unlike anything I had ever seen. At home we got out of the car and my sister and brother got my Mom to bed. I had stayed outside to watch and as the sky cleared more toward dawn, the meteors were nearly constant until the sky got too light to see them. Most stunning thing I ever saw or have seen since.

I've always been a big fan of space exploration, child of the 50's and 60's. Watched every liftoff that was on TV, would have hitchhiked with my son to see the nighttime liftoff of Columbia except I had work the next day. Plus he and a cousin drove down watched the launch, ate, made a pit stop and drove straight home. He took great pictures the old time way.My Dad had a first heart attack(coronary thrombosis) in March 1960. He became ill one evening and we had to take him to St E in Covington in November 1966, my junior year of HS, about 10 days or a week before Thanksgiving. I know the date because I wanted him home for the holiday. He had improved during the night and the cardiologist told my Mother that she should go home to rest. It had been a cloudy night driving to the hospital. We left in the early am hours to come home and the sky was only partly cloudy. As we drove south on U.S. 27, the clear spaces in the sky was filled with shooting stars. Unlike anything I had ever seen. At home we got out of the car and my sister and brother got my Mom to bed. I had stayed outside to watch and as the sky cleared more toward dawn, the meteors were nearly constant until the sky got too light to see them. Most stunning thing I ever saw or have seen since.

 

Thanks for sharing that. What did you think of Hale-Bopp when it made it's appearance in the late nineties? I was mesmerized. H-B put on a much greater show than the most famous comet, Halley's, did back in 1986.

 

Btw, stay tuned for some info on the 2017 Perseid meteor shower.

It's getting about that time to begin watching for the Perseid meteor showers. How many of you folks watch these every summer???

 

The Perseid meteors are meteoroids ejected from Comet 109(Swift-Tuttle), which orbits the sun once every 133 years. All along its orbital path, this comet leaves behind a debris field. Around this time every year, the Earth's orbit crosses this comet's orbit and leads to one of the most fiery and spectacular "shooting star" shows we can see.

 

Perseid meteors are renowned for producing long arcs of light and color known as fireballs. At the peak of the meteor shower, you may be able to see up to 150 meteors per hour.

 

So when do you need to start looking and where in the sky do you need to look?

 

You can view the Perseid meteor shower now. It was visible beginning July 17 and it will culminate on August 24. There should be a good view from almost everywhere in the northern hemisphere.

 

When will the shower be at its peak performance???? These dates you will want to remember: August 12 and August 13. These are the evenings when you may get lucky and see 100 or more "shooting star's" per hour.

 

The best time to view meteors is between midnight and dawn when the sky is dark and the meteors are radiating light from a location high in the sky. The radiant for the Perseid shower, of course, is in the constellation Perseus. This constellation rises in the northeast in the early evening and will be high in the sky shortly before dawn.

 

Of course, for best viewing, you will need a clear night and you will want to get as far away from city lights as possible. The less light pollution, the more meteors you will see. Also, since the Moon will be three-quarters or so full around peak time for the Perseid shower , you will also want to locate somewhere that blocks off some moonlight.

 

Good luck viewing the Perseid meteors this year. Take the time to make a wish upon a falling star!!!!

 

 

 

I was walking my dog a couple nights ago and saw a meteor. I was wondering at the time was it a prelude to the ones that show up in August.

I was walking my dog a couple nights ago and saw a meteor. I was wondering at the time was it a prelude to the ones that show up in August.

 

Indeed. I saw one as well. Now you know. Prelude to the big show in mid-August.

Edited July 23, 20179 yr by Science Friction

What would it take to completely sterilize every single cell of life on our planet out of existence? Would a gigantic asteroid do it? What about an exploding star or a gamma ray burst??? Stay tuned...

What would it take to completely sterilize every single cell of life on our planet out of existence? Would a gigantic asteroid do it? What about an exploding star or a gamma ray burst??? Stay tuned...

Gamma ray burst would definitely do the job. I read an article about that in one of the science magazines, maybe ID magazine. Scary scenario.